One of the primary benefits of digital photography is the ability to take photographs without worrying about the relatively high per-photo cost of film and development. As a result, people may take several digital photographs as opposed to one film photograph. While this has its advantages, a drawback is the sheer number of digital files created and the difficulty of organizing the files on a computer.
Most digital cameras use a portable storage medium on which to store digital image files. In order to most conveniently view, organize and edit the images, these files must be transferred from the portable storage medium to a more persistent storage such as the hard drive of a computer.
Several methods exist to accomplish this function. One is to connect the digital camera to a computer via a data transfer cable such as USB or FireWire. Some operating systems offer a “wizard” or other system for easing the difficulty of transferring the images; however, these methods are usually performed with a multitude of confusing “dialog boxes” or similar Graphical User Interface (GUI) elements. A user has little to no visual feedback on the source of the images, the destination of the images, and the method to initiate or cancel the transfer.
Other techniques exist whereby the camera's storage medium may be “mounted” in a computer's operating system much like a hard drive. One example of this is a flash storage medium such as a Compact Flash card being inserted into a “reader” which is usually connected to a computer via a data transfer cable. Using this approach, users may perform actions on the digital image files much like they would with any other file. In a command-line environment, command-line tools may be employed to transfer the images from the portable media to a hard drive, for example. The lack of visual feedback offered by this method is obvious. With a GUI environment, digital image files may be “dragged” to their desired destination arid a copy function may be automatically engaged.
The drawback to the GUI approach is the same drawback that exists with any GUI operating system wherein users must manipulate files in a “tile-folder” metaphor. The desired location may be a folder nested 5 levels deep, or into a folder so cluttered that the images are not easily retrievable without effort.
There exist applications to assist users in importing and managing digital images, Some of these applications allow a user to create separate folders within which to store images, thereby easing the task of cataloging images. Some applications do not physically store the images in these folders, but operate as a database where the folder merely offers a convenient method of organization. The files themselves may not be stored in the folder, but merely a symbolic copy associated with the destination.
While the prior approaches may ease the task of importing and cataloguing images, there exists a need for a way to directly import digital images to a specified folder and provide graphical feedback to guide the user.
The approaches described in this section are approaches that could be pursued, but not necessarily approaches that have been previously conceived or pursued. Therefore, unless otherwise indicated, it should not be assumed that any of the approaches described in this section qualify as prior art merely by virtue of their inclusion in this section.